Chapter 34
When we pull up to Joan’s house, Mick is pacing the front yard, phone pressed to his ear. Phoebe bolts from the car and runs across the lawn, collides with him, arms tight around his waist. He strokes her hair and tucks his phone into his pocket as her face tilts up.
Dean and I watch in silence before opening our doors.
“They found her!” Mick calls out.
“Thank God,” I say under my breath.
Mick walks toward us, Phoebe still clinging to him.
“Is she okay?” I ask.
“Yeah. She made it all the way to the Kwik Trip.” Mick shakes his head, exhaustion etched across his face, sweat darkening his gray T-shirt. He looks past me to Dean. “I’m sorry to interrupt your dinner.”
“Don’t worry about dinner—we were finished anyway,” Dean says. “We’re just glad she’s okay.”
Seconds later, a squad car eases up the street, light bars flashing silently. We watch a young officer step out and help Joan from the backseat. Her hair is wild, her cardigan misbuttoned, her shoes caked with mud—but she’s smiling.
While Mick speaks to the officer, Phoebe rushes in with a tangle of hugs and reprimands. “Gram! We were so worried about you!”
Dean and I stand off to the side.
“Oh, heavens. I’m fine,” Joan says, smoothing her pants. “I was just going to the store.”
“You can’t walk to the store at night! It’s too far!” Phoebe says.
“I just wanted to bake a cake for Erin. She won the spelling bee.”
My heart clenches.
Dean slides his arm around me.
“You mean me, Gram?” Phoebe asks.
Joan blinks. “Yes. You.”
“That’s so sweet of you, Gram, but it’s not safe for you to walk alone at night.”
“Oh. Pfft.”
“Feebs,” I say.
She looks up at me.
“Why don’t you help Gram upstairs and get her into some cozy PJs?”
Phoebe nods, then takes Joan’s hand. “C’mon, Gram. Let’s go inside.”
When I turn back, the officer and Mick are finishing up.
Suddenly, it’s just the three of us on the front lawn.
Mick’s eyes flick to mine, then to Dean. “I was only gone an hour.”
“I know,” I say. “It’s not your fault. This is too much for one person. We need to get her into a home.”
He exhales. “Can you guys come in for a minute? I was hoping to talk to both of you.”
“Sure,” I say.
Dean and I follow Mick into the house, through to the family room. We sit in a loose triangle.
“So I talked to a lawyer yesterday,” Mick says.
I nod, waiting.
“He says it would help a lot if we had a will—or anything in writing.” He pauses. “We can’t rely on Joan’s word—even without the Alzheimer’s.”
“I didn’t see anything like that when I cleared out Erin’s desk, but I’ll look again tomorrow.”
Mick nods. “I put Erin’s things in the garage. And you might want to look through Joan’s stuff, too.”
“Will do,” I say.
“What if you don’t find anything?” Dean asks.
“Then we’re intestate,” Mick says. “Probate will crawl, and we can’t touch Erin’s accounts until a personal representative is appointed.
Meanwhile, guardianship is in limbo until someone files.
We’ll need two petitions—guardian of the person for Phoebe’s care, and guardian of the estate for her money.
The judge can grant a temporary order, but it only lasts six months, so the clock’s already ticking.
” He looks at me. “I heard Cara’s thinking about filing. ”
“Seriously?” I say, my neck suddenly hot. “Who told you that?”
“Grapevine. Apparently she thought you were making up our conversation with Joan.”
“Shit,” I say.
“If she files first, she’d probably get custody. She’d have a compelling case—probably better than either of us.”
“That can’t happen,” I say, my words coming out too fast. “Phoebe doesn’t want to live with them.”
Mick nods. “I know. We need to file.” He pauses, his gaze drifting. “I’m happy to handle one or both guardianships. Or I can yield to you. We just need a plan.”
Silence stretches.
“I have a question for you,” Dean says, looking at Mick.
I hold my breath.
“Yeah?” Mick says.
“I know you’ve been doing so much here. But if Billie and I decide to move forward with guardianship, would it be hard for you to step back?”
“Step back?” Mick blinks.
I shoot Dean a look. He misses it.
“Would you be okay if we ended up pursuing sole custody?”
Mick’s eyes flare, but his voice stays calm. “Yes. As I just said, the ball’s in your court.”
Dean shifts in his chair. “I thought you were talking about court filings. Not real life.”
“Look,” I say. “We all want what’s best for Phoebe—right?”
They both nod.
“So we need to work together here,” I say, looking directly at Dean.
Footsteps pad on the stairs. Phoebe appears in the doorway.
“Are you guys fighting?” she asks, her voice small.
“No,” I say. “We’re just talking.”
She nods, looking unconvinced. “Gram’s in bed.”
“Thank you, honey.”
Phoebe hesitates. “I know I asked if I could sleep over with you, Billie, but I think I should stay here tonight. With Gram.”
“I think that’s a good idea,” I say.
“Can you stay over, too?”
I glance at Dean. “Not tonight, sweetie. But I’ll be back first thing in the morning.”
“Okay,” she says, stepping into my arms.
Over her shoulder, Mick meets my gaze, then looks away.
—
As Dean and I enter my parents’ house, Hank barrels out of the kitchen, nails skittering across the hardwood. I kneel on the floor, taking one deep breath of his warm dog smell before clipping on his leash and straightening.
Dean hovers just inside the doorway as if he might step wrong.
I brush past him and down the porch steps, and he follows me into the yard while Hank meanders, nose to the grass. The night presses down.
I wait for Dean to speak, the silence tight between us.
“Are you mad at me?” he finally asks.
“What do you think?” I say. “Tell me how you think that conversation went.”
He blinks. “I thought I was asking a harmless question.”
“It wasn’t harmless, Dean. It felt like a grenade.”
“He heard it the wrong way. Clearly, you both did.”
“Well, what’s that tell you?” I say. “And it’s a hell of a way to show gratitude after all he’s been doing for Joan and Phoebe.”
“I’m sorry. I’m just trying to navigate everything—”
“I know you are. But I need you to dial it back a bit. Right now we need to stabilize things, not make big decisions.”
“I wasn’t trying to make big decisions. I was trying to discuss options.”
“Look, Dean.” I take a breath. “I appreciate that you’re invested in Phoebe’s future. I really do. I’m just asking you to take a beat.”
“I’m trying.”
“Thank you. It means a lot to me that you skipped Bobby’s wedding to be here. But you don’t know Phoebe. You didn’t know Erin. And uprooting an eleven-year-old and plopping her into your two-bedroom Manhattan apartment isn’t a no-brainer.”
Dean’s eyes snap up. “Neither is co-parenting with your ex.”
It lands like a jab.
“That came out wrong,” he says, “but I do get the sense he wants joint custody.”
“No. That’s what Erin wanted.”
“Yet there’s no evidence of that.”
“Joan told us—”
“She’s hardly a reliable source.”
“What are you saying?” I stare at him. “That Mick conspired with an Alzheimer’s patient?”
“I don’t know what’s going on. I feel out of my depth.”
“We all do, Dean. It’s a terrible, tragic situation.”
He meets my gaze for a long beat. “Just tell me you don’t still have feelings for him.”
“Wow,” I say quietly. “Is that what you think is happening here?”
“Just tell me.”
“I don’t have feelings for him,” I say, my voice softening. “I love you.”
“Do you think he has feelings for you?”
“No. I think he has a wonderful girlfriend he barely sees because he’s so busy looking after a child and an elderly woman.”
“I think you’re wrong about that. I see the way he looks at you—”
“That’s not what’s happening here, Dean—”
“And no matter how you slice it, this is a messy tangle. If we’re going to take this on, I think it should be cleaner.”
“Cleaner how?”
His throat works once, twice. “Mick shouldn’t be part of it.”
The porch light flickers overhead; somewhere a sprinkler starts.
He exhales. “I’m just being honest with you—”
“Well, thank you for your honesty.”
We stand there.
Hank tugs me forward, his collar jingling, the sound small in the night air.